TBR | The College System of Tennessee

Title:  Director of Major Gift Development

Department: Foundation

Number of Positions: 1

Classification: 2m

Type of Appointment: Full-Time

Pay Rate: $75,470 - $95,230.00/per year. Pay will be determined based on related work experience above required. To be considered in determining pay, all related work experience must be listed on the application.

Required Documents Needed to Upload at Time of Application: Resume, transcripts and three professional references.

Reference check requirements: 

• Supervisory roles: two (2) current or former supervisors and one (1) current or former direct report
• Personal references (friends, clergy, customers, relatives) are not considered acceptable references

Position Summary: The Director of Major Gift Development develops, implements and evaluates a comprehensive development program for the College that includes major gifts, planned gifts, governmental and community relations and grant development by cultivating relationships with a wide range of leaders and stakeholders including local and state elected officials, governmental organizations, corporate and private foundations, individual donors and business and industry.

The Director of Major Gift Development works collaboratively and strategically with the president of the College to develop influential relationships with leaders across a broad range of stakeholder groups, cultivating support from advocates, donors, and business and governmental leaders, and offers prospect strategy and counsel to the president and the executive director of the Foundation.  The Director of Major Gift Development serves as the Community and Government Relations Liaison for the College at large, developing and executing the College’s Legislative Communications Plan to place the institution at the greatest strategic advantage. 

The  Director of Major Gift Development manages all aspects of major gift development for the College, including individual and corporate donor identification, qualification and cultivation; case statement and proposal preparation; solicitation of gifts; development and implementation of a program of planned giving,; grant proposal drafting, editing, and submission; grant compliance reporting (in partnership with the Director of Grants), stewardship of major, planned gift, and grantor donor relationships (in partnership with the Director of Community Outreach & Donor Engagement) and community and government relations advising to the president of the College.

Essential Functions:

40%​ Major Gift Development:  Collaborate with College leadership across five campuses and partner with corporate and community stakeholders across the region and the state to execute strategies to secure major gift funding to support the College.  Collaborate with academic deans and faculty to promote departmental objectives, raise awareness, and ultimately develop department-specific stakeholder and donor relationships.  Identify and qualify funding opportunities that advance the College and the Foundation through prospect identification, research, and cultivation.  Lead and coordinate all aspects of a major gifts campaign, including collaboration with Marketing and Communications to prepare proposals, case statements and campaign collateral materials used for major gift solicitation.  Solicit and close on major gifts.  Steward major gift relationships, including individual donors and corporate philanthropy.

25% Planned Gift Development:  Develop a comprehensive, integrated program of planned gift initiatives designed to identify, cultivate, solicit, and steward donor relationships with the Foundation.  Use moves management to cultivate annual and alumni donor relationships into planned gift intentions.

25% Community and Government Relations Liaison:  Cultivate relationships with local and state governments, chambers of commerce, and other influential stakeholder groups. Monitor local and state policy initiatives and budgets.  Serve as local and state community and governmental liaison and advisor, attending public meetings and events and coordinating efforts to secure grant funding from governmental bodies such as the Tennessee General Assembly, Appalachian Regional Commission, Tellico Reservoir Development Agency, and local Industrial Development Boards.  Promote the College and the president by developing productive relationships with local and state governmental leadership.

5% Grant Development:  Pursue successful grant funding for the college by identifying grant funders, cultivating relationships with corporate and private foundations, and developing grant proposals, including researching, writing, and editing.  Secure letters of support and teaming agreements from government, education, and business and industry partners necessary to apply for and execute funded grant initiatives.  Supervise Grant Development Coordinator to execute prospect identification, qualification, and solicitation tasks. Review and edit grant proposals and grant compliance reports before submission.

5% Assist with special events designed to raise funds and/or recognize donors.  Network to develop beneficial relationships for the College and Foundation at business and community events before and after regular work hours.  Represent the College in community organizations.

Note: The College reserves the right to change or reassign job duties, or combine positions at any time.

Key Results Areas:

The measurable outcomes for Major Gift Development are:

• Increase major gift funds raised and pledged
• Increase number of planned gifts pledged
• Execute Legislative Communications Plan, including meeting quarterly benchmarks
• Increase total grant funds awarded

Job Requirements: 

Bachelor’s Degree; Master’s Degree preferred; Familiarity with Blackbaud Raiser’s Edge data management system preferred. 

Five to ten years demonstrated experience in development and procurement of major gifts, preferably in a higher education setting.  Successful experience in community relations and/or government affairs.  Outstanding oral and written communication skills, strong interpersonal, organizational and analytical skills required.  Skilled in building relationships, listening and negotiating.  Ability to work effectively with diverse people and organizations.  Must be highly motivated and self-directed.  Demonstrated leadership and the ability to successfully manage multi-functional or diverse initiatives.

Part-time work experience is calculated at 50% credit of full-time work experience.

Complexity & Creativity: 

The position requires a great deal of analytical, technical and creative thinking, as well as a focus on strategy development to achieve College advancement objectives. Deep and broad knowledge of the region’s history, leadership, and relationships is required to be successful.  There is not a policy, procedures or standards manual to guide this work.

Analytical: Must evaluate prospect opportunities critically and analytically, synthesizing philanthropic cross-ties and community relationships to assess and connect prospective donors with College development opportunities; Connect long-range objectives with near term actions; Understand the economic, social and political climate of the multi-county College service area, matching college advancement with economic development priorities.

Technical:  Must synthesize and integrate prospect research, changing institutional and business leadership and organizational priorities with college programmatic priorities and knowledge of prospective funding opportunities to develop successful fundraising outcomes.  Must work collaboratively with Marketing and Communications to develop winning major gift proposals.  Excellent written and oral communication skills required.  Must maintain understanding of Internal Revenue Service regulations and federal tax advantages, for prospective donors, particularly planned gift donors; Must understand tax advantaged gift planning, including bequests, trusts, charitable gift annuities, life insurance gifts, gifts of real estate and other forms of property, gifts of securities, major gifts-in-kind and other gift arrangements; Must maintain knowledge of Foundation gift acceptance policies

Creative Thinking:  Must develop creative and authentic gift proposals, drawing on prospect research and attentive relationship building.  Must understand private donor psyche and corporate social responsibility credos to develop opportunities for investment that meet both the College’s and the donor’s objectives.  Must create donor cultivation opportunities that delight and surprise, leading to increased institutional advocacy and investment.

Strategy Development:  Must interpret public policy landscapes and state budget funding priorities to place the College at the greatest strategic advantage for development.  Must monitor and interpret social, economic and political trends that might affect fundraising efforts for the College Must work collaboratively with campus deans and departmental leadership to promote departmental objectives, raise awareness, and ultimately develop department-specific stakeholder and donor relationships.

• to promote departmental objectives, raise awareness, and ultimately develop department-specific stakeholder and donor relationships. 
• Direct or supervise major gift campaign volunteer leadership
• Interpret the Meaning of Information for Others — Translate or explain what information means and how it can be used to best advantage for the College, in particular public policy and local and state government initiatives
• Observe and report on social, economic, and political trends that might affect fundraising efforts for the College

Magnitude of Impact: The Director of Major Gift Development must possess trusted relationships with executive leaders in corporate, government, and community organizations across the region and the state.  The Director of Major Gift Development must work collaboratively across the Foundation and College, including Grant Development, Alumni Relations, Donor Communication and Outreach, Scholarship Development, Marketing and Communications, Campus Deans, Academic Departmental leadership, Business and Community Services and the President’s office.  Outcomes from Major Gift Development impact the College for decades to come, via relationships and funding that are cultivated or left to wither.  Problem intervention would be addressed by the Executive Director of the Foundation.

Responsibility for Accuracy: Typical errors might occur in calculations or typos.  The Foundation staff and the Marketing and Communications department work as a team to coordinate efforts to identify, cultivate, solicit and steward donors and to prepare, edit and submit winning grant proposals.  This team effort reduces the likelihood of errors.  If errors are not detected or if proposal deadlines are missed, funding may not be awarded and future relationships jeopardized

Financial Impact: The Director of Major Gifts is responsible for ensuring that all major gifts, private foundation gifts, and planned gifts given to the Foundation are executed efficiently, effectively, and in compliance with terms of the gift or grant award. Failure to do so may result in the College having to reimburse the donor or granting agency for inappropriate expenditures, the loss of the grant, an inability to apply for future grants and/or a loss of future donations to the Foundation.

Budgetary: The Director of Major Gifts does not have departmental budgetary responsibility or signing authority, but provides input to the Executive Director of the Foundation for operating expenditures. The Director of Major Gifts must understand capital project and equipment budgets and timelines to match effectively funding opportunities with college funding priorities.  

Judgement and Decisions: The Director of Major Gift Development prioritizes cultivation opportunities both internally and externally to advance grant or private fundraising.  Most decisions are made independently. The VP of Academic Affairs, VP of Business & Finance, Executive Director of the Foundation, and the President of Pellissippi State provide guidance and make decisions pertaining to staffing and budgeting, contractual relationships, and prioritize College facilities, programs and equipment.

Nature of Contacts: The Director of Major Gift Development interacts with multiple stakeholders both internally and externally.  Internally, the Director meets with faculty and staff members from virtually every division at the College including Campus and Academic Deans, Marketing and Communications, Human Resources, Academic Affairs, Business & Finance, Economic & Workforce Development, Student Affairs, the Tennessee Consortium for International Studies, Placement Office, and Institutional Effectiveness, Assessment, and Planning.  Externally, the incumbent meets with Foundation Board members, governmental and elected officials, business and corporate leaders, economic development officials, donors, prospective donors, retirees, and alumni.

The Director seeks understanding of corporate, foundation, governmental and personal philanthropic and policy goals.  The Director influences, persuades and solicits corporate, foundation, governmental and prospective donors to invest cash gifts or pledges and on the behalf of the College. The Director negotiates donation amounts, pledge terms, and naming  opportunities for gifts.  The Director provides persuasive information to the public during presentations.  The Director must be a perceptive listener, able to discern individual, corporate and government policy and funding priorities. The Director must maintain deep, trusted, and diverse relationships in Knox and Blount Counties and with leadership in state government, including elected officials and members of the State Building Commission, Tennessee Board of Regents, Tennessee Higher Education Committee, , and the Governor’s office.

Physical Demands:

Position requires scheduling flexibility.  Out of office meetings are essential, with many networking events occurring outside of the 37.5-hour workweek.  Must be able to conduct donor tours and events across five geographically separate campuses.  Car travel, including travel to the state capitol, walking to events or meetings, standing up at events, and lifting boxes, files, signage, or other work-related items is required of this position. Some overnight travel, occasional weekend work, and frequent early morning and evening responsibilities.  Manual dexterity is required for emailing and other forms of electronic communication.

Ability to hear written and oral instructions.  Employee must be able to listen to and understand donor and grantor funding priorities and requests.

Visual acuity is required to walk into different households, office buildings, corporations, and restaurants every day.  Developing brochures and pledge forms and reviewing them to determine their accuracy and/or various donation levels requires visual acuity.  Researching different websites such as Guidestar.org, Grants.gov, and the National Science Foundation Fast Track system requires the ability to see.

Color perception is necessary to prepare and read color graphs and charts, as well as major gift campaign collateral materials, planned gift solicitations, and grant proposals.

This position can experience disruptions during work from donors, faculty, students, and others visiting or calling the Foundation offices. The work environment is free of dust, fumes, and smoke.  Heating and air conditioning with adequate lighting is provided.

• • Near continuous use of a computer.
  • Constant interruptions.

An open office space with frequent visitors.

Hazards: The Director is exposed to the student population and general faculty and staff and could be exposed to illness or an unforeseen incident i.e. workplace/campus violence.  This is a stressful, high-stakes position

• Minor cuts from paper.
• Eyestrain, back strain from computer work.

Full-time Employment Benefits:

• Insurance Options Health, dental, vision, life, short/long-term disability, FSA/HSA Wellness Incentive Program, if  enrolled in health plan

• Educational Assistance Fee Waiver Spouse/Dependent discounts Audit/Non-Credit Reimbursement Program

• Employee Assistance Program

• Retirement options Tennessee traditional pension plan option (TCRS) 401k with $50 company match/457/403b

• Employee Discount program with over 900+companies

• 13 Paid Holidays/Year Includes paid days off the last week of December

• Sick Leave Bank

• Longevity Pay

• Many opportunities for professional development

Special Instructions to Applicants: To be considered for a position at Pellissippi State, you must create an on-line application. Your skills, abilities, qualifications, and years of experience will be evaluated using only what is recorded on your application. Work experience that is not listed on the application will not be considered towards compensation. Please note: attaching a resume does not substitute for completion of the application form. Part-time work experience is calculated at 50% of full-time experience. Please note: to scan, upload, or attach documents, a computer and scanner are available at the Hardin Valley Campus Educational Resources Center, if needed.

Pellissippi State Community College is an EEO/AA/Title VI/Title IX/Section 504/ADA employer

If you have any problems or questions please contact Human Resources at Pellissippi State Community College’s Human Resource Office at 865-694-6607 or by email at recruiting@pstcc.edu.

If you are interested in this position, click on the link to the left to apply.

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